Sesquicentenial State Park, July 18, 2012

Sesqui can be found off Two Notch Rd. in Columbia near the intersections of interstates 20 and 77. It was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1937, has a lake with canoes and fishing , a dog park, camping, hiking and mountain cycling trails and lots of Canadian Geese.

The ranger suggested I take the 6 mile blue diamond trail and I started out with Boofa before 9:30. "Follow the blue diamonds", she said and I did.
The landscape here is typical of the Sandhills of South Carolina, flat  where long ago there was ocean,with white sand, tall pines and scrub oaks.  The trail is winding and twisted, covered with a soft blanket of pine needles.  It is the kind of land my grandparents lived on in Lancaster County where my cousins and I would take the old pickup and load the younger kids in the back and drive sand roads like this through woods like this.  Afterwards we would go to the spring where a dipper gourd hung from a branch and get a sip of the cool clean water.

There were little or no landmarks on this trail and after I had gone more than two hours and passed a tall dead pine where beavers or deer had eaten away a large chunck at knee level, I knew I had been traveling around the same path again.  Finally I came out of the woods onto a large trail in front of a sign pointing right saying "bike trail".  The problem was I didn't know whether to go left or right.
Along came a hiker with a small gray terrier. Unfortuntately she was also lost.  We hiked along together in the direction the sign pointed.  Soon we met a gray haired man in a T shirt emblazoned with the word, "Finland".  He told us he walks there every day and pointed the way to the park office and water.  "Keep walking and lower your cholesterol and blood pressure and then go home and drink a big glass of whiskey," he said.

Mandy, her dog, Daisy and I made it to her car and she drove us farther on to my car, before she drove on to her next destination at Peach Tree Rock.  It was noon, we may have gone ten or twelve miles today by accident.

In the car, I turned on the new radiio station, 92.1, The Palm, and heard:

Bless my Heart
Bless my Soul
Didn't think I'd make it to 22 years old.
There must be somebody up above
You got to hold on...
Got so much to do
Aint got much time...
Girl, you got to get back up...